Oh No! Train Wreck at Politico!

Over at Politico.Com, Andrew Glass, a "senior political editor" has written a piece on George W. Bush and the pardon power which is, well, something to behold. The piece is linked here. Glass begins by saying that George W. Bush has used the pardon power in a "stingy and haughty" way. Of course, the first notion is worthy of empirical testing. The second simply places most of the cards face up on the table and, well, there is something admirable to that, I suppose.

For some odd reason, Glass wants to say that President Bush issued a "reprieve" or a "remission" for Scooter Libby (as opposed to the "commutation" that you and I, and the rest of the world, have been reading about). While, from an academic point, this kind of hair splitting is interesting, it does not do Glass well, because he later demonstrates that his hands are quite full when dealing with just the very basic forms of clemency.

The "closest parallel" that Glass can find to the Libby commutation is the 1992 pardons of six individuals involved in Iran Contra. But Glass says Ronald Reagan's pardon of two FBI officials (Felt and Miller) was in "similar vein." That is to say, Glass' search for parallels has the stench of non-original research all over it. He may very well have Googled "top ten pardons" before he started writing.

While he is in copy-cat mode, Glass adds:

If Bush grants Libby a full pardon before he leaves office, the interim remission of his prison sentence could be seen as a way of letting Libby maintain his Fifth Amendment rights. If those rights were off the table, Congress could compel Libby to testify about what was really behind the leaks that got him into trouble.

Wow. It has been at least three months since I heard that tune (see commentary here). But, before the repetition completely dulls the senses, Glass starts to season the analysis with spectacular error:

Since taking office in 2001, Bush has commuted only three other sentences, all involving minor nonviolent drug dealers who had already served many years in prison. If he keeps to this languid pace, Bush 43 will fall well behind Bush 41 — who himself issued only a skimpy 77 pardons in his four years in office.

First, George H.W. Bush did not grant 77 pardons. He granted 74 pardons and 3 commutations. Second, how can George W. Bush (who has already granted 113 pardons and 4 commutations and has over a year to go) "fall well behind" his father? Must be the new math, or something. Is Glass the only person in the world who does not know that pardons typically increase in the last year of a president's term?

And yes, it gets worse. Glass writes:

The current president is on track to beat the record of the first president, George Washington, who issued the fewest pardons: 16.

I am still thinking 113 pardons and 4 commutations beats 16 pardons, but maybe that is just me. And, of course, George Washington does not hold "the record" for the fewest pardons granted by a president. Glass could have worked his way to that with just a little bit of effort. In sum, the Politico bit some serious dust on this one!